Annual Report 2022

From the very beginning, our video lessons are designed to level the playing field in education: They are free, we publish them under Creative Common licenses, and most importantly — thanks to the fact that they are created by teachers and 100% adapted to the core curriculum — they are primarily used to be able to make up at home for the material covered in school. In addition, for over half a year, all our films have Ukrainian subtitles so that children with refugee experience who found themselves in Poland after the outbreak of the war in Ukraine could participate in Polish education.

[In Cambridge you have] all of this amazing science and technology right in this one square mile. And young people are walking by it each and every day without any idea of what’s happening inside those buildings. We tapped young people on the shoulders, introduced them to worlds they never experienced, and watched them bloom. I worked in high tech for 20 years and did some other things. But from a fulfillment perspective, nothing’s come close to this. It’s by far the most rewarding work I’ve ever done.

I really enjoyed the class where we built and learned in Minecraft. In a group of four, we built the city of the future together. I was responsible for inventing a modern way of delivering food to the city, but in the end, after talking with the group, we came to the conclusion that it’s good to eat organic food and everyone [needed] their own garden. We planned together, discussed what is needed to implement our ideas. I really enjoyed it and would like to participate in such a project again.

​​Children have played over 3 million games on the platform. On the Google Play store, we saw an additional 200,000 plays over the course of the year. Out of these, 300,000 challenge activities were completed — a 9.5% increase over the previous year. One million practice activities were completed in the last year — a 3.9% increase over the previous year.

The Akamai Foundation was super generous and worked with Fast Forward so we could develop a portfolio of tech nonprofits that were working specifically on diversity in tech. [Since we started working with Akamai] we’ve met a ton of Akamai employees that were just gonzo for using their professional skills to give back to social causes that they cared deeply about.

We are honored that the Akamai Foundation selected NPower to build alternative pathways to high-growth careers in tech. The generous grant allows us to grow our advanced training programs in cybersecurity and expand internship opportunities for our students. This is a powerful partnership that will have tremendous impacts on the underrepresented young adults, women of color, and military veterans we serve, and will help them obtain the valuable training, job placement and support services needed to advance their tech careers. It also is a powerful statement on the importance of a diverse talent pipeline.

The Akamai scholarship is an investment in my future education and my dream of chasing a better life for myself, my family, and society as I aspire to become a cybersecurity professional. […] (A2M4Tech’s) guidance and mentorship have been invaluable and have played a significant role in shaping my career and academic success. Once again, I thank you from the bottom of my heart for your investment in me and your thoughtful scholarship. Without your kind generosity, it wouldn’t be possible to make my dream a reality.